Absent from the director’s chair for nearly a decade, Billy Bob Thornton is on a tear behind the camera. Last spring he unveiled his Willie Nelson documentary “The King Of Luck,” and he’s currently in Berlin premiering his latest effort “Jayne Mansfield’s Car.” And it seems he’s been doing some wheeling and dealing as well, as he’s already lined up his next effort behind the camera.

Alexander Rodnyansky‘s AR Films and Geyer Kosinski‘s Media Talent Group are backing “And Then We Drove,” the plot details of which are under wraps. Said to be based on Thornton’s “personal experiences” he explained the rough outline of film as, “a guy who’s on a road trip and picks up this girl along the way, and what happens to them. It’s about the question of life: ‘What is this? Where do I fit in?’ ” And the project gets a bit more buzz with some insiders claiming that the U.S. road pic (set in Los Angeles, New Mexico and Arizona) is inspired by Thornton’s relationship with Angelina Jolie. The duo were famously married for three years and known for their eccentric behavior, which included keeping vials of each other’s blood so this could be… interesting, to say the least.

Anyway, back to post-war family-drama “Jayne Mansfield’s Car,” which boasts a strong ensemble cast including Robert Duvall, John Hurt, Frances O’Connor, Ray Stevenson, Robert Patrick, Marshall Allman, Katherine LaNasa, Shawnee Smith and young lead John Patrick Amedori (pictured below with Bacon). As Duvall previously explained, the film follows “a guy in between WWI and WWII who raises a family after his wife left him for an Englishman and moved to England. When the wife dies, she asks to be brought back to Alabama to be buried, and at that point the character hasn’t seen her in 20 or 30 years. The two families — her original family she abandoned and her English family — meet and then things get really interesting.”

No word yet on when ‘Jayne’ will land in theaters, but Thornton seems to be particular about the release of his films. He has apparently received several offers for “The King Of Luck” but is still holding out until a package comes along that includes a theatrical release. [Variety]